Rules? What Rules?

I'm deep into the third book of the Outlander series. If you've never read the books by Diana Gabaldon, I highly suggest them. My head is wrapped up in the ecstasy and agony of Claire and Jamie and what could possibly happen next! I've been meaning to finish all five books before the new one comes out this year. I hear OUTLANDER has been successfully optioned for film and they're currently casting characters. But who knows where that stands, really. All I know is that they're going to have to go some to make the movie as magnificent as the novels.

But, here I am, not only devouring the novels, but studying Diana's writing style. She's quite a genious, in my opinion. Her research is amazing (like Jodi Piccoult) and, once again, Gabaldon holds me in the palm of her hand as my time slips into the stratosphere. We Gabaldon readers tend consume her books in only a few day-long reading marathons.

What's even more amazing to me, is she breaks every damn rule in the book. Not only are her novels 800 pages to over 1,000 pages in length, she does stuff like change point-of-view not only within the paragraph, but within a sentence!!! In the book VOYAGER, I recently read point-of-view being changed twice in one sentence. I just sat there. Stunned. I had to read it over and over. But then I started to laugh. The way she wrote it, it made perfect sense. I understood who was thinking when, and was not confused by any "talking heads."

Now, if you've ever sat through months/years of creative writing classes, as well as hours of never-ending writing conferences, you would know that changing point-of-view within a paragraph or a sentence is a huge WHAT-NOT-TO-DO RULE. A big no-no. It warrants immediate rejections from editors and agents. Unless, I guess, if you've already sold millions of books and your name is Diana Gabaldon.

You go girl. My hero.

Blessings to you and yours, Ms. Gabaldon.